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Defense attorney makes opening statements in trial of Los Angeles Rams' strength coach

Megan Diskin, Ventura County Star Published 7:17 p.m. PT July 8, 2019

Certain factors at play, including medical ones, will show a Los Angeles Rams coach accused of sexual battery was not able to form the necessary criminal intent to commit the alleged offenses, the coach’s defense attorney said Monday.

The other factors are the medication he was taking after a stroke-related event and the alcohol he consumed the night of the alleged incident, said Vicki Podberesky, one of Ted Rath’s defense attorneys.

“...And that will lead you to the only one conclusion, and that’s that Ted Rath is not guilty,” Podberesky said.

She made the remarks to jurors in her opening statement as Rath’s trial continued in Ventura County Superior Court.

Rath has pleaded not guilty to three counts of misdemeanor sexual battery in connection with an alleged June 2018 incident reported at a Moorpark home. Rath, the strength and conditioning coach for the football team headquartered in the Conejo Valley, is on a leave of absence while his case is ongoing.

Senior Deputy District Attorney Erik Nasarenko gave his opening statement Friday, telling jurors the Moorpark woman, who was 33 at the time, was asleep in her bed when she was awakened to hands on her buttocks.

The woman, who sleeps in the nude, claims the hands moved to her stomach and then her genitalia. When she rolled over she allegedly saw Rath by her bed, Nasarenko said.

Rath and his wife had met up with the woman and her husband at a charity event on June 15, 2018. Afterwards, they went out to a local bar then returned to the woman's house to keep the party going. Rath’s wife did not go there with them, Nasarenko said.

Other friends and neighbors would meet there, too, he said.

Podberesky said jurors needed to know what happened during an incident on May 7, 2018, to fully understand. That’s when Rath suffered a stroke-related event while at work and was rushed to Los Robles Regional Medical Center in Thousand Oaks, Podberesky said.

In a meeting that day, he felt as though he was nauseous, he couldn’t talk, his vision was blurry and he couldn’t concentrate, Podberesky said. And she said jurors would hear all of those things from Rath himself.

“He’s gonna testify in this case,” Podberesky said.

Rath spent a few days in the hospital and lost 14 pounds, Podberesky said. He then spent the next several weeks at home recovering before heading out to a charity event on June 15, 2018.

“It’s the first event he’s had any real significant amount of alcohol” since the May 2018 episode, Podberesky said. Since then he had been taking aspirin and Lipitor, she said.

But Podberesky said Rath suffered another kind of episode. He felt a “sensation” and woke up the next day feeling confused and achy. His memory of the night was not all there, she said.

During testimony, the woman's husband said they called authorities to report the incident a few days later, but first told a few friends, including one who was at the house the night the alleged incident occurred.

The trial is scheduled to continue Tuesday.

Megan Diskin is a courts and breaking news reporter with The Star. Reach her at megan.diskin@vcstar.com or 805-437-0258.

The Rams have been pretty clear they want to see how this plays out before they make a final decision on Rath. Based on his defense, hard to see how the Rams keep him but we'll see...

If the defense is ultimately, "yes I did it, but..." I'd fire him, regardless of the verdict.

I was hoping he wasn't guilty but saying he couldn't feel up some woman because he was on aspirin? Or because he got drunk after being in the hospital? I could see how they'd argue he might not be able to have intercourse but his hands weren't suffering from dysfunction. Dude's a goner.

moklerman wrote:I was hoping he wasn't guilty but saying he couldn't feel up some woman because he was on aspirin? Or because he got drunk after being in the hospital? I could see how they'd argue he might not be able to have intercourse but his hands weren't suffering from dysfunction. Dude's a goner.

I don't think that's what the defense is saying.

They're saying that the combination of alcohol and whatever they gave him in the hospital had him so messed up he wasn't responsible for his actions.

Might be an okay legal defense but it's not good for much else and i don't see how the Rams are gonna be able to stick with him...

I'd fire him for drinking excessively only a couple weeks after having a stroke

dieterbrock wrote:I'd fire him for drinking excessively only a couple weeks after having a stroke

No kidding. None of this adds up to someone who's "innocent".

I thought he was just going to have a hard time patently denying that he did anything wrong, not that he did it but he was loopy so it doesn't count.

Elvis wrote:I don't think that's what the defense is saying.

They're saying that the combination of alcohol and whatever they gave him in the hospital had him so messed up he wasn't responsible for his actions.

Might be an okay legal defense but it's not good for much else and i don't see how the Rams are gonna be able to stick with him...

The law in question turns heavily on issues of intention. What did the accused intend. On the other extreme, if we accidently brush up against someone in a crowd, the other party might be offended, but we broke no law--we did not intend physical content based on any kind of sexual motive.

I think that's what Rath is doing. It's not just that he was not responsible for his actions, he's saying it was not a conscious intention on his part, but the effect of being messed up. Since the law in question turns heavily on intention, he and his team are targetting that.

That might get him acquitted, it might not.

At least he's not playing the "blame the victim" card and claiming nothing happened, which in turn would paint the woman as a false accuser....something which, as we know, can often happen in cases like this.

But yeah even if acquitted, it's hard to see how he will be able to return to the Rams.

....

/zn/ wrote:The law in question turns heavily on issues of intention. What did the accused intend. On the other extreme, if we accidently brush up against someone in a crowd, the other party might be offended, but we broke no law--we did not intend physical content based on any kind of sexual motive.

I think that's what Rath is doing. It's not just that he was not responsible for his actions, he's saying it was not a conscious intention on his part, but the effect of being messed up. Since the law in question turns heavily on intention, he and his team are targetting that.

That might get him acquitted, it might not.

At least he's not playing the "blame the victim" card and claiming nothing happened, which in turn would paint the woman as a false accuser....something which, as we know, can often happen in cases like this.

But yeah even if acquitted, it's hard to see how he will be able to return to the Rams.

....

So can we use “issue of attention” if we mix alcohol and medication while driving an automobile and cause an accident?

dieterbrock wrote:So can we use “inattention” if we mix alcohol and medication while driving an automobile and cause an accident?

I;m not defending him btw. Just sort of unpacking what his defense appears to be. I;m not a lawyer but this is what I've put together. The laws pertaining to your hypothetical don't turn on intention when it comes to how they're written. First off it's illegal to drive drunk in the first place. You are liable for the consequences regardless.

Here's a comment on the law in question. It is considered misdemeanor sexual battery if:

The defendant intended to engage in the unwanted touching for the purpose of sexual gratification, sexual arousal, or sexual abuse. If the defendant touched the victim for a non-sexual purpose, such as a medical professional conducting an examination, it might be more difficult for the prosecutor to establish the required elements for a successful case.

The intention is an explicit issue.

I have no idea if his defense will work or is valid (though to me it doesn't sound valid), but here your explicit intenion matters. But if I get drunk and crash and hurt someone, it's still a felony DUI regardless whether or not I intended to cause harm.